Bleeding Green

Vince Papale's story is better on color than play-by-play.

by Shaun Brady

Recommended

Vince Papale can give all the interviews he wants claiming that his is the universal story of a man living his dreams, but having seen the film in a room full of cheering Philly faithful, it's clearly being received as a love letter to the city's fans. The old snowballs-at-Santa chestnut is trotted out for the uninitiated, but the 700-level crowds and clusters around 13-inch TV sets pull off just the right mix of dogged loyalty and outright hostility. Take away the local color, though, and what's left is a well-worn playbook of underdog-makes-good moves, executed by a team that doesn't even pretend to have the element of surprise on its side.

EAGLE FOR A DAY: Mark Wahlberg as the birds' Papale.

Mark Wahlberg plays Papale as a brooding working-class loner beaten down by hard times and bad breaks. Brad Gann's script extends that feeling to the whole of 1976 South Philly, represented by Papale's barfly buddies, who play pickup football games in a muddy lot to escape the hardships of economic recession. When Papale gets his big chance, the community focuses its hopes and jealousies on him, the one guy who can speak quietly and tone down his accent, which in Hollywood terms means he has a chance of getting out.

That chance comes with the arrival of new Eagles coach Dick Vermeil, played by Greg Kinnear's blow-dried 'do. To shake things up, Vermeil stages open tryouts, which grants director Ericson Core his first of many opportunities for a football-field montage, this one concentrating upon the expected batch of weirdos and fat guys taking pratfalls.

As Papale manages to squeak through tryout after tryout, Wahlberg maintains the same restrained demeanor; sure, this is a man who keeps his emotions in check, but he always seems to need the gig more than he wants it. You get the impression that he would display the same resilience if he were interviewing for a job flipping burgers. He seems to overcome obstacles through a bullheaded urge to show the doubters back home, from his ex-wife to that guy at the bar who keeps calling him a loser. Not to mention the local sportscasters who keep pronouncing his name wrong on TV.

But if the struggle to get there is lackluster, the football itself is shot with the high-impact immediacy of a highlight reel. There is a grainy authenticity whenever the players take the field that belies the phoniness of much of what surrounds it (not least Wahlberg's romance with Elizabeth Banks, playing the wife-to-be whom Papale actually met post-Eagles. As always, in Philly it pays to stick to one rule: Shut up and play the game.

(s_brady@citypaper.net)